After a relatively quiet month of May to date, Will Power and Team Penske ascended to the top of the time sheets on Fast Friday at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, with the Australian reaching speeds in excess of 232mph.
With additional boost levels provided for all Chevrolet and Honda-powered drivers for the day’s running ahead of this weekend’s two days of qualifying, and for the first time this week, Chevrolet-power hit the top of the time sheets, although the feared ‘big gap’ between those with Chevrolet-power and those with Honda-power seems to have been unwarranted.
Power’s fastest lap of 38.6810s, at a speed 232.672s, was only 0.0546s and 0.328mph faster than Josef Newgarden, who took his Chevrolet-powered Ed Carpenter Racing entry into the second spot.
James Hinchcliffe was the leading Honda-powered entrant in third place, and was just beneath the 232mph barrier, with the Schmidt Peterson Motorsport setting a best time of 38.7978s around the legendary 2.5-mile oval.
Carlos Munoz finished the fastest of a quartet of Andretti Autosport drivers, all of who were above 231mph, with team-mates Marco Andretti, Townsend Bell and Ryan Hunter-Reay just behind the Colombian ace. Bell had the distinction of setting the best lap of the day unaided by a tow at 231.342mph.
Gabby Chaves continued his strong month of May with the eighth fastest time for Dale Coyne Racing, with his performance this weekend made all the more impressive bearing in mind that ten days ago he was looking at sitting out of the race altogether, having been out of a ride since the season finale of the Verizon IndyCar Series in 2015.
Mikhail Aleshin also broke through the 231mph barrier, with the Schmidt Peterson Motorsport driver running a quickest lap of 38.9502, which is a speed of 231.064mph, while Alexander Rossi just missed out on the 231mph, with the Andretti Herta Autosport driver’s best lap of 38.9867s seeing a speed of 230.848mph.
Eighteen drivers broke the 230mph barrier, while all thirty-three drivers got a good number of laps in ahead of the first of the two qualifying sessions on Saturday, with a total of 1346 laps being completed.
The only stoppages were for track inspections and debris, while running was also stopped for around thirty minutes due to light rain falling on the speedway.
Indianapolis 500 Fast Friday Practice Times
[table id=1102 /]
